Breaking Point

When I was young enough that our porch came up to my chest,
both my parents still went away to work every morning and I was watched by my grandparents.
Every morning I would cry, shoving my face against couch cushions the same way I did when I got earaches.
I hated that they left.
In preschool, a girl named Nicolette hit me on a play date at her house because I forgot to take off my shoes.
I didn't actually forget, but I didn't want to take them off and risk her leaving me in the time I took.
Every road trip I would sit in the car hours ahead of our departure for fear of being forgotten.
Every time I climbed up the slide in kindergarten it was so that I couldn't be left behind the rest of the group.
I was usually the last one to go and the only one caught and reprimanded.
In first grade I followed two girls to go to the grocery store from the house
because they said it was safe. We were caught by the babysitter halfway through and I felt stupid for following
but I knew I would have felt worse staying.
I would listen to and repeat rumors about anybody so long as it meant I wasn't the kid picked on for one more day.
I tried to dress the same, act the same, think the same.
In fifth grade my horseback trainer went out in flames, scorching us with her.
We moved trainers and the new one said I could go far, we just needed to buy a different horse. From her.
We trained with her but didn't get a new horse, and eventually the one we kept turned to sandstone.
We took her to a new trainer and when she saw a chiropractor we learned she was out of alignment in 12 places
and probably in severe pain.
In sixth grade I discovered two girls were feeding one of my friends rumors about me being backstabbing
and she had believed them. My heart went out of alignment.
I didn't bother to correct her because I knew it'd just happen again.
After the horse had healed we started me riding her again but I still had big issues with fear,
couldn't manage much without locking up and bending double,
crying in frustration at myself for being so stupid.
I worked in the library during breaks most of that year, and only sometimes were the cool kids bored enough
to come in and mock my life.
After I finally got over the worst of my fear, life smoothed.
I caught pneumonia in seventh grade at the beginning of summer, was too weak to ride for weeks and had to ease back into it.
I managed to get back to where I was and started showing again.
In eighth grade I was ready to move up a level in my "not-a-sport" riding when I dislocated my kneecap and motivation.
It was my birthday.
I was in physical therapy for months, had to have surgery to loosen ligaments and clean out bone chips.
people thought I was a wimp when I didn't rejoin PE upon relearning to walk, and they were right. I whimpered a lot.
I cried whenever I thought of not being able to ride.
I watched videos of old shows so that I could remind myself what adrenaline felt like.
I was off for four months and it took another five to regain enough strength to be close to where I was before my injury.
My brain still isn't completely back.
In August of that year I tried to compete at the level I left off on and was too tired to finish the second phase of my non-sport.
Then the horse burned out, couldn't handle the strain any more and I had to find a new one and move her to light work.
In my first real show with the new horse I was too nervous to talk and the trainer half-assed my warmup preparation.
I forgot to make a turn, earned six penalty points and a sense of betrayal.
My mom yelled at him while I walked my cross country course a fourth time to avoid confrontation and tire my nerves.
It has been ingrained in my being that nobody is dependable one-hundred percent of the time,
nothing is certain except uncertainty.
People ask me about my plans for the future and I say "I dunno"
they think I'm a slacker but I know that no long term wishes can be depended on.
I just try not to get attached or dependent on anything.
I divide my dependency among different people so when I'm let down by one I fall a shorter distance.
People think I'm aloof,
I'm afraid.
I want my mistrust to break.
Andrea Gibson once said "I want to break like the Berlin wall"
Never have I related to a single sentence more than then.
And now I ask you,
please,
break me.